


Sharing The Load.

by Ultra_chrome



Category: due South
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-05-07
Updated: 2007-05-07
Packaged: 2017-11-20 11:06:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,237
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/584722
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ultra_chrome/pseuds/Ultra_chrome
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Post Ladies Man. Fraser tells Ray about his own mistakes.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sharing The Load.

Fraser could see that Ray had reached his breaking point. He’d been so close to that for days and now, as Ray walked out of Beth Botrelle’s house, Fraser knew that this was it. There was no more desperate energy. No more anger. There was nothing more Ray could focus on to divert his mind from his own feelings on the matter.

When Ray began to cry Fraser was not surprised or uncomfortable. He simply placed a hand on Ray’s shoulder and waited. He was there for Ray and he let it be known without words. Words, at this juncture, would be useless. There were times in life, if one was unfortunate enough, or inattentive enough, when a past mistake would resurface and crush one with its weight. The only thing to do at this moment was hope that Ray was as resilient as he led the world to believe. Now was a time for companionship, not talking. Ray would let him know when he was ready for that.

He reached into his pocket and passed Ray his handkerchief. It was accepted as wordlessly as it had been offered.

When the gut wrenching sobs had dissipated and Ray was beginning to take the long, controlled breaths that indicated that this particular wave of anguish had passed, Fraser got out of the car and walked around to Ray’s door. He opened it, waiting until Ray handed him the keys and moved to the passenger side.

As Fraser drove, Ray came further out of his despair, blowing his nose and apologising for both his outburst and the use of Fraser’s handkerchief.

“Nonsense, Ray. That _is_ after all, what they’re for. To not use it would be denying the purpose of its existence.” He pointedly refrained from commenting on Ray’s show of emotion. He hoped that Ray understood that it meant there was nothing to apologise for.

He got a watery smile in return and knew that Ray would recover. Not unscathed, but stronger all the same. It would take time, but Ray would use this pain to grow. That’s what scar tissue did, covered past wounds, thickened the skin. And if that part never looked quite the way it had, at least it served as a reminder of survival. For better or worse.

As he pulled up in front of Ray’s building, Fraser was more than a little surprised when Ray placed a hand on his arm. “Uh, Frase? Can you…I mean, you wanna come up? I don’t…It’s just…too quiet, you know?” Ray took his hand away and rubbed the back of his neck. The time for words had obviously come, and Fraser was pleased that it had come so soon.

They walked up in silence, Ray strangely subdued. It was perfectly obvious that the man was emotionally drained, but to Fraser’s eyes it was so atypical that it was almost surreal. This was a side of Ray he hoped never to see again. He would do everything in his power to make certain he didn’t have to.

_Everything in his power_ ….it stirred an echo of his own past mistakes. Distant now, but still painful.

Ray put his keys on the counter and headed for the kitchen cupboard. “Alcohol.” He stated, in the voice he used when he didn’t want an argument. His mouth said, “Toast the Queen with me, buddy?” But his eyes held a thinly veiled plea. _“Please don’t make me be drinking alone.”_

Fraser rubbed his eyebrow, shuffled his feet and opened his mouth to decline. But Ray had seen the signals and had already lost what animation the action of pouring his drink had given him. Fraser couldn’t bear to see Ray like this so he said, “I’d love to, Ray.”

He wasn’t lying. He loved the way Ray brightened instantly and handed him the glass. Loved the way his fingers brushed Ray’s as he took it and loved the way Ray actually smiled as he raised it to his lips.

He could share one drink with his partner, his _friend_ , if that’s what it took. He pretended not to notice that the drink Ray poured for himself was considerably larger than the one he’d handed over.

When Ray picked up the bottle and carried it to the couch he seemed almost back to his normal self. Only his reddened eyes gave even the slightest indication of the last hour.

They settled down and sat in companionable silence for a few moments before Ray announced he’d be right back and headed to the bathroom. When he reappeared it was evident from the wet spikes of his hair that he’d washed his face, and he sat back on the couch with a heavy sigh, glass once again in hand. “That was fucking horrible.” he said with a grimace.

“I can imagine, Ray. But you must remember that because of you, Ms Botrelle is now a free woman. And rightly so.”

He took small sip of his drink and then jumped as Ray turned to him angrily.

“You can imagine? You have no fucking idea, Fraser. FIVE TIMES! Five times they nearly killed her. She said she’d rather be dead after the fourth one. I PUT HER THERE! Do you get that? I screwed up and _I’m_ the reason that she spent eight years in hell. How can you imagine that? How?” He scrubbed his hand through his hair and down the back of his neck. Then he looked Fraser in the eye. “How?” Ray demanded.

Putting his glass carefully on the coffee table, Fraser took a deep breath to steady himself before he spoke.  
“I, too, have made mistakes, Ray. More than I care to remember. In fact, I’ve made unforgivable mistakes. But that’s not important right now. What _is_ important is that you understand that you ultimately saved that woman’s life and gave her back her freedom. What put her there was not you breaking the chain of evidence. What put her there was one man’s corruption and his desire to hide that corruption. You are not to blame for her incarceration. You were merely the arresting officer.”

Ray looked thoughtful then. “But if I’d read the note…”

“If you’d read the note, you still would have broken the chain of evidence. You did what you thought was right, Ray. You investigated the possibility of a perpetrator still in the house. You made an arrest that any police officer would have made. And before you say it, if you hadn’t picked up that piece of paper, you would never have had reason to believe it had been switched. This would have certainly resulted in Ms Botrelle actually being put to death. So. Even though you didn’t follow procedure for one brief moment, you did do the right thing.”

Ray leaned back on the couch and closed his eyes. “Yeah. Makes sense. So why do I feel like a piece of shit?”  
“Because you’re a good man, Ray. You care.”  
“You _would_ think that. You think everyone is good.” Ray sat up straight and reached for his drink, draining it in one gulp before picking up the bottle to refill his glass.  
“Not everyone. There are many evil people in the world, Ray, as you well know.”  
“Yeah, Fraser, I know that, but you trust everyone. So what mistakes?”

Fraser went rigid. “Mistakes?” He asked warily.

“Mistakes, buddy. What are yours?”  
It was Fraser’s turn to drain his glass, which was a mistake in itself as he choked when the liquor burned his throat. He spluttered and went red, both with lack of oxygen and the deep shame he felt as his errors in judgement came to mind.

Ray rubbed his back in hard, fast circles, but he said, “Hey, don’t change the subject. Spill. What’s the perfect Mountie done that’s so unforgivable?”

When he regained the ability to speak, Fraser said, “I don’t think this is the time, Ray.” He told himself that his voice was husky from coughing, even as he knew it wasn’t true.

“This is the time alright, Frase. There has never been a better one. You’ve seen me at my all time worst, except for when Stella kicked me out, so give me a little something to balance it out, okay?” He moved his hand up to his partner’s shoulder and gave it a little shake, then just let it rest there as Fraser attempted to draw himself a little straighter in his seat.

“Ray, I really don’t see how this is going to benefit either one of us. It was a long time ago and I prefer not to talk about it.” He looked at a point just over Ray’s shoulder, but Ray could see that his eyes were a little desperate. Fraser really didn’t want to talk about it, which made Ray even more certain that he needed to know.

“C’mon, Frase. Tell me. I think I got a right to know, don’t you?”

Fraser stood and walked to the window, looking out at the dull view from Ray’s apartment. Grimy walls across the street and a few neon lights. But that’s not what he saw. He saw falling snow and a train gathering speed as it took his chance to correct his mistakes away from him. Unlike Ray, he’d never be able to right his wrong. He couldn’t help but wonder if he would ever have been able to, even if things were different.

He knew Ray wouldn’t leave well enough alone, so he started to speak. He would tell it the same way he had told it before, the only way he knew he could get the words out without breaking.

“There was a woman. She and two men robbed a bank in Alaska. She drove the getaway car. One of the men died, one fled south, and she came across the border in a light airplane. It was forced down due to bad weather and the pilot abandoned her. I tracked her to a place called Fortitude Pass. A storm had been blowing for days, and by the time I found her I’d lost everything; my pack, my supplies. She was huddled in a crag on the lee side of a mountain, almost frozen. She was very near death. So I staked a lean-to with my rifle and draped my coat around it and I held onto her while the storm closed in around us.”

He paused to will away the tremor that was rising in his voice. _Why didn’t this story get easier to tell with time?_

He heard a movement behind him and turned to see Ray standing very near, two glasses in hand, one extended toward him. For a brief moment he thought of refusing, but escaping from the pain he was feeling was too strong a temptation so he took the drink with a shaking hand.

Ray reached out and took hold of his arm, urging him back to the couch. He looked longingly at the window, but Ray gave a small tug at his sleeve, and he followed his friend, accepting the small comfort afforded by his presence.

As they sat down Ray cleared his throat, “I don’t want to stop this confession or whatever, but do you think you could…like not give me a prepared speech?”  
When Fraser looked up in alarm, Ray continued. “I know your story-telling voice, buddy, and this is _not_ the time for it. You’re, uh… talking about that Metcalfe woman, aren’t you? Victoria.”

Fraser dropped his eyes to his glass and nodded, just the barest movement of his head. “How much do you already know, Ray?”

Ray sighed and tried to recall all that he had read in Fraser’s file. “You turned her in. When she got out of prison, she came looking for you, set you up for the murder of her partner and made it look like you were in on the whole robbery thing, or at least sharing the cash. Vecchio, too. And when you tried to arrest her at the train station Vecchio shot you by mistake. He was aiming for her, but you got in the way. That about it?”

“No, Ray, not quite all of it.” Fraser sipped his drink and grimaced at the unfamiliar burn, but he didn’t put the glass down. He looked at Ray taking a comfortable mouthful and wondered if it might be a good thing to accustom himself to the taste of strong alcohol. But he knew, deep down, that he couldn’t trust himself to let go, couldn’t let his guard down in the way that Ray seemed to find so easy and he envied his friend.

Ray nudged Fraser’s knee with his own and said quietly, “So tell me how it was then.”  
Fraser dropped his eyes to his glass, avoiding Ray’s gaze, but Ray ducked his head to catch them again and gave him a small smile and an even smaller nod. It was a gesture of encouragement that did little to ease Fraser’s discomfort.

He cleared his throat and tried to decide where to begin. His mind recoiled from the memories that would make Ray understand his actions, and yet he knew that he needed to face them, bring them out into the open if he were to open up in the manner that Ray had always been open with him. He took another sip of his drink and braced himself to start at the beginning of his downfall.

“As I said, Ray, she was very near death. So I… I held her and I talked to her.” He looked up and saw that Ray was watching his face. He blushed and turned away slightly, unable to meet Ray’s gaze.  
“After a while I couldn’t talk anymore. My voice…I put her fingers in my mouth, to keep them warm.”

From the corner of his eye he saw Ray shift, settling back on the couch. He was about to continue when Ray spoke.

“Wait. You put her fingers in your mouth? All ten of them?” Ray’s voice had taken on the quality of patient disbelief that he used on a particularly nervous witness and Fraser understood that there would be no glossing over the small details he wished to keep to himself. For some reason he found this more reassuring than disturbing and answered with a rueful smile.

“No. Despite your insistence to the contrary my mouth is not big enough for that, Ray. Just the fingers of one hand.” He relaxed a little and dropped his eyes to take up the tale again.

“Hold on,” Ray stopped him again, this time holding up one hand in a gesture somewhere between a point and a wave. “Where did you put her other hand?”

Fraser looked at Ray, incredulous. _Did he want to know what happened or was he just keeping the conversation going in an attempt to keep Fraser from leaving him alone?_

“Does it matter?” he asked impatiently.

“Yeah, Frase, it does. So where?”

“Inside my shirt. Under my armpit if you must know.” he replied snappishly. When Ray merely raised one eyebrow at him he understood the point Ray was trying to make. _Why hadn’t he put both of her hands under his shirt?_

He carefully placed his glass on the table then, aware that he had already let too much slip and knowing that any further consumption of alcohol would only make matters worse. His momentary confidence that Ray would understand was now gone and he stood abruptly, going once more to the window. It would be best if he could just get this over with as quickly as possible.

“Sometime later I lost consciousness. I was no longer cold, only tired, and I knew it meant I was succumbing to hypothermia. I…” He touched the cool glass with his fingertips. “ I was aware that I was dying, Ray.” He took a somewhat ragged breath, trying to regain control of his voice.

Behind him, Ray spoke again. “How long were you stuck there?”

It was an impersonal question, and therefore one he could answer easily. “About 36 hours, I think. Maybe more. I’m not entirely sure, what with the periods of unconsciousness and the fact that I wasn’t wearing my watch at that point.”

“Long time,” said Ray, noncommittally.

“Yes.”

“So how come you didn’t die? I mean, I’m really glad you didn’t, you know, for obvious reasons. What I mean is…if you were sure you were going to, why didn’t you?”

Fraser sighed. “Well, obviously I was wrong, Ray. But that’s not the point. The point is, she talked to me. She woke up and she talked to me for hours, just as I had to her. I didn’t know what she was saying, I only knew that she had the most beautiful voice I’d ever heard and the words were incidental. I know now that she was reciting a poem, over and over.”

Once again Ray interrupted. “What poem?”

Fraser rested his forehead on the window pane. “Does it matter?” he asked for the second time in as many minutes.

“Dunno. You tell me.”

“No, not really.”

Fraser waited; somehow sure that Ray wasn’t finished with his line of questioning. He wasn’t mistaken and yet he was still surprised when Ray asked, “So where were _your_ hands, Frase?”

Turning to face Ray, Fraser folded his arms in front of his chest and raised his eyebrows in exasperation. “In my mittens, Ray. Where else did you think they would be?” He knew that his voice betrayed his annoyance at the turn this confession was taking, but he couldn’t find it in himself to care. If anything he welcomed the irritation, it took his focus away from the pain of remembering.

Ray raised his hands in a gesture of surrender, “Hey, just asking, okay?”

Rubbing his eyebrow with his thumbnail, Fraser nodded and began to speak again.

“When the storm had passed and we found ourselves alive we retraced my steps until I found my pack. We camped in that spot the first night and ate everything in one meal. It was a foolish thing to do, but…” he found that he could come up with no excuse for his actions that Ray would understand. He couldn’t bring himself to say that Victoria had been ravenous and he had only wanted to make her happy. He paused, waiting for Ray to question him again, but there was silence from the couch so he continued.

“It took four days to get to the nearest outpost. We camped just outside of town that night. We could see the church’s steeple, but little else. I admit that by that stage I was somewhat reluctant for our time together to be over. I felt as if I had known her forever.”

“Yeah, buddy, I get that. So…uhhh…all that time…you only have the one sleeping bag?”

Fraser took a deep breath and steeled himself for the questions he knew were coming. “Yes, Ray,” he replied when he felt strong enough.

“You do anything with her?”

“Ray! I hardly think…”  
But Ray cut him off. “It’s important.”

“I don’t see how.”

“Just is, Frase, trust me.”

Fraser weighed his priorities, did he protect the honour of a woman who had been a source of anguish to him for so long, or did he confide in his partner? A partner who had opened himself up to Fraser from the very beginning. He had given very little of himself in return and he felt the discrepancy as a void now. Ray was his closest friend and he knew that meant sharing secrets. It meant trusting that those secrets would be kept. How could Ray trust him completely if he didn’t hold some of Fraser’s own secrets in return?

Even as he reached his decision, he turned away again, knowing that it would be easier to say what he needed to if he didn’t have to meet Ray’s gaze.  
“Not until that night. I…well, it would have been inappropriate of me to… I mean, we huddled for warmth, but until that last night we weren’t intimate.” He breathed a sigh of relief as the words finally formed a sentence that he felt he could live with having uttered. Only then could he turn again and face Ray, who was looking at the now empty glass in his hand with an expression that Fraser had never seen on his face before.

“Ray?”

“Sit down, Frase. You’re makin’ the place look untidy.”

As Ray leaned forward to pour yet another drink for himself, Fraser noticed that his hand was less steady than it had been when he poured the last one. He wondered if Ray was drunk enough to let him get through the rest of his confession unquestioned. But by the time he reached the couch again, Ray was turning to face him with obvious intent.

“You know it was still inappropriate that night, too, don’t you?”

“Yes, but slightly less so in light of the manner…”

“She started it, huh?”

“Yes, Ray.”

“And what happened after that?”

“You want _details_?” Fraser asked incredulously.

Ray laughed harshly. “No you freak, I mean _after_ , after.”

“Oh. We talked some more and she asked me to let her go. Nobody knew that I had found her and she could… she could just…walk away.”

For some reason Ray looked almost defeated by this last piece of information. He scrubbed his hand vigorously through his hair, making it stand up in places and flattening it in others. The thought occurred to Fraser that this was how Ray looked when he woke up each morning and he pushed the image aside firmly. He was almost startled when Ray spoke again.

“Was that your first time?” He asked hesitantly.

“No, Ray. I’d tracked many criminals by this point. Often in even more inclement weather. In fact…”

Ray’s hand on his thigh stopped his words. “With a woman, Fraser.”

This was too much. Too personal. Fraser cast around for a way to delay; to avoid answering a question that he knew Ray was unaware had larger implications than were apparent. His eyes lit on the half drunk glass he’d left on the table earlier. It seemed an age ago, yet he knew only minutes had passed since he placed it there.

His hand shook slightly as he reached for it, but by the time he raised the glass to drink he had regained control. As he felt the burn slide down his throat, he wondered how he could convey to Ray the fact that, while he had not been unfamiliar with sexual relationships, Victoria had indeed been the first woman he had been with.

It was cowardly, he knew, but he couldn’t bring himself to give Ray more than he had already conceded tonight, and so he merely nodded, not trusting his mouth to keep the secret of his usual preferences. He told himself it wasn’t a lie, merely the withholding of information.

“Okay,” Ray said, “Then you turned her in.”

Fraser nodded again.

“And she did some time, while you felt guilty for doing the right thing. Am I right?”

“Well I wasn’t entirely sure that it was the right thing, Ray.”

Ray took his hand from Fraser’s thigh, leaving the place where it had rested feeling suddenly cold. He strode across the room, just like he always did when he was trying to put a chain of events together in his mind. As if the movement sped his thought process. Under other circumstances, Fraser found that endearing. Tonight, it made him uneasy.

“She robbed a bank. It was the right thing.”

“She drove the car, Ray. She was living in an abusive relationship with the man who planned the robbery. It wasn’t like she had many options.”

Ray wheeled and pointed. “Bullshit, Fraser. That is bullshit and you know it. You always have options. You told me that yourself, so don’t tell me she didn’t have options.”

There was nothing he could say to that, if he were honest with himself, and so he said nothing. Ray continued pacing for a moment and Fraser wondered if the landlady was downstairs listening to him ‘clomp’. If she were being soothed, even as he felt a growing tension with each of Ray’s steps.

They were coming to the worst of it now. Ray would soon find out about the side of him that he fought to hide from the world. The darkness and the despair that had all but swallowed him.

Ray stopped in front of the window, as if blocking Fraser’s only mental escape and took a deep breath. “Right. So she did the crime, she did the time, and then what? She just happened to end up in Chicago looking to start a new life?”

“Well, at first that appeared to the case, although as events unfolded it became apparent that she had come looking for me. You see, she had planted a box of cash from the robbery under the floorboards of my father’s cabin, and then burned it. The cabin, not the money. It seems she had hoped that the authorities would find the box when they investigated the cause of the fire, bringing my character into question”

With the words once again flowing from his mouth, Fraser found it a little easier to breathe. He could do this. He could tell Ray the chain of events in as much detail as was strictly necessary and then it would be out in the open. He would deal with the aftermath of remembering later, alone in his office. And if the grief was once again too much to bear alone, he could retreat to his closet, warm his frozen heart by the fire in his father’s new cabin. His father knew the worst of it and would at least be stoic in the face of his own irrational anguish.

“Yeah, Frase, I read that bit. How did she find you? She just turn up at the Consulate one day and ask for one of those How To Be A Canadian leaflets, or what?”

“No, Ray, I saw her in the street. Twice, I believe. And then, as I was I leaving the Patrician Grill, she walked in. She literally bumped into me.”

“Sure she did.”

“She did. And at that point in time I had no reason to believe it was anything but a happy coincidence. A second chance, so to speak. So we ate. And then I invited her back to my apartment. For dinner.”

Ray nodded distractedly and opened his mouth to speak again, but shut it as a small frown formed on his face. He looked up then, into Fraser’s eyes, holding them with a fierce expression. “You ate and then you invited her back for dinner? Is that some kind of a…” he waved his hand a little, “metaphor?” The last word was spoken hesitantly, as if he was unsure he had chosen the right one and Fraser was surprised to find himself almost smiling at Ray’s characteristic uncertainty with words. The familiarity of it served to remind him that Ray was his friend, that this was _not_ an interrogation after all.

“No, it really was dinner.” He thought for a moment. “Well, perhaps it was a metaphor of sorts. Food being a luxury we didn’t have in our previous time together. But we _did_ actually eat dinner. I went to the store while she started cooking, and when I returned we ate by candlelight and then watched television for a while, before I walked her back to her hotel. Or what I thought was her hotel. She led me to believe she was staying there, but I discovered later that she had never checked in. I headed back to my apartment and on the way I bought a small soap carving from a street vendor. I discovered that she had put money into my wallet. I assumed it was because I had refused to let her pay for the groceries I had bought earlier. But the bills were from the robbery. Sometime after I arrived home there was a knock at my door…Ray?”

He was unsure how to go on from this point. He’d never told this part of the story to anyone that wasn’t asking specific questions, and then none of the more intimate details had come into it. None of the important details. The thought of attempting to do so now was making him feel decidedly ill, and his palms began to sweat. He rubbed them on his jeans as Ray looked at him with an inquiring raise to his eyebrows.

“I’m unsure…that is to say, I’m not entirely certain…” He took a deep breath and blurted, “I don’t know how to tell you this. I’ve never spoken of it, except while being interrogated and…” he could feel the desperation rising now. He wanted to run, to hide from Ray, hide from himself, even though he knew that he could never succeed at either.

He struggled to control his breathing and Ray was at his side in an instant. A firm hand rested on Fraser’s shoulder and Ray was speaking softly to him. He could barely make out the words, immersed as he was in self loathing. This loss of control was unconscionable. He needed time to arrange his words. Time to separate them from the emotions of the memories he had worked so hard to push to the back of his mind. The only problem was, he didn’t think that one lifetime would be enough.

He took a few deep breaths and realised that Ray was waiting for a response. He tried to recall what Ray had been saying, but had to admit he hadn’t the foggiest idea.  
“I’m sorry, Ray. What were you saying?” He rubbed his eyebrow as he spoke and made a conscious effort to straighten his spine.  
Ray gave him a small, rueful smile. “I said; would it be easier if I just ask you stuff and you can go from there?”  
“Honestly? It would be easier if we could avoid this conversation altogether.” Fraser replied, knowing that he was hoping for the impossible, but that it didn’t hurt to try.

Ray laughed then and the sound seemed unnatural in the current atmosphere. He gave Fraser’s shoulder a final squeeze and a tiny shove. “Not gonna happen, buddy,” he said. “It’s all or nothing with these… confession things. It’s like if you don’t tell me everything, I’ll be walking on eggshells. Not knowing what I can say and stuff, without freaking you out. Which would suck, because… well, it would. And eggshells? Not good for walking on, you know? They smash and your feet get all sticky and kinda eggy smelling. Urgh!”

Ray gave a mock shudder and Fraser managed a tight smile and a deep sigh. He appreciated Ray’s attempt to lighten the mood. Even more importantly, the concerned light in Ray’s eyes was far from the distaste he had been expecting. If Ray thought him weak, there was no indication and for that he was deeply grateful.

“Very well, Ray. Ask away.”

“Okay, you gonna drink this?” Ray picked up Fraser’s glass and when Fraser shook his head slightly, Ray took a sip.

“Right then. So…uh…you walked her back to where she was staying. _Supposed to be_ staying, and then you went home. Let me guess, the knock on your door? It was her, wasn’t it?”

“Yes, she came back to ask me why I had turned her in. She was angry and hurt and I didn’t know what to say to her. So I…I kissed her instead. We… she stayed for three days.”  
“Three days is a long time to kiss, Frase.” Ray held up a hand when Fraser made to correct him. “I know. You didn’t just kiss. I was being…what’s that word?”  
“Flippant, Ray?”  
“Flippant, yeah. So you shacked up for three days. Bet your solve rate sucked a bit that week, huh?”

Fraser knew what Ray was doing, had seen him interview suspects often enough to realise that he was making light of the situation in order to gain his confidence. He found he didn’t care. It was comforting to have the Ray he knew back. The Ray who found humour in the smallest things and didn’t appear to care if it made him seem foolish. This Ray was his friend and wouldn’t judge him harshly for his emotional weakness.

“Actually, I didn’t do any police work at all during that time. I went to work at the consulate on the second day, but left early. I couldn’t concentrate, knowing she was waiting for me. I couldn’t think of anything but her. I forgot about a previous engagement I had with Ray Vecchio.” He paused a moment, remembering the look on his other Ray’s face when he opened to door and found him standing there. He squeezed his eyes shut at that memory and continued to speak.

“He came to my apartment. He was angry at me. He had every right to be. I’d lost track of the days and if the truth be told I don’t think I would have been willing to leave her anyway. But I had also borrowed money from him and as I hadn’t seen him, I had no opportunity to pay him back as agreed.”

“So he chased you down for it?”

“Oh no, Ray. In fact when I apologised and gave him the money I owed him, he made it abundantly clear that the money was not the issue. I think he was mostly annoyed that I had missed his gathering and that I had not introduced him to the woman that had meant enough to me to induce such uncharacteristic behaviour. It was terribly remiss of me, and when he left I went after him to apologise, and to explain. We were halfway down the street, talking, when we heard a gunshot. From my apartment.”

Fraser took a shuddering breath and looked over at Dief, who opened one eye and then deliberately shut it again with a slight huff. Resisting the urge to once again apologise to his companion, Fraser carried on.

“When we got there everything was a mess, Diefenbaker had been shot.”  
“Yeah Frase, I remember reading that bit. She stole your gun, shot Dief and then that Jolly guy. There was something about you setting up a deal for her. What was that? How come you didn’t bring her in?”

“I had to let it be her choice this time. I’d already made that mistake once and I couldn’t make it again. I needed her to choose the right way for herself. For us.” He could feel heat behind his eyes and willed himself not to let the tears form. It wouldn’t do to cry now, when the pain of betrayal was supposed to be far behind him.

“But she didn’t. She chose wrong.” Ray said quietly. “What was with the tip-off to Internal Affairs about Vecchio’s house? How’d she get in there?”

“Ah, after she shot Dief, I found her and she led me to believe that Jolly had come for her and that Dief had been trying to protect her. Ray was kind enough to allow her to stay at his home as a means of protection, but she planted a key there. It opened a locker at the train station that held a suitcase full of money from the robbery. She used it as leverage to get me to complete a diamond deal for her. The whole thing was very cleverly thought out, really. She had me take traceable bills to men who would no doubt be prepared for such an occurrence. They offered me a lesser deal, but she had demanded I return with the entire amount previously agreed on. I simply gathered the diamonds up and made a run for it.”

Fraser cleared his throat and looked around as if suddenly remembering where he was. His mouth felt unbearably dry. He stood, intending to go to the kitchen for a glass of water, but Ray grabbed the seam of his jeans at the side of his thigh and pulled him back down to the couch.

“Where you goin’, Frase?”

Fraser blushed at the intimacy in both Ray’s voice and the manner in which he had touched him.

“To the kitchen, Ray. I need water.”

“I can get that. You stay put.” As he went to get Fraser’s drink, Ray asked, “How come I.A. never found the key?”

“Because I found it first. I couldn’t very well leave it there, knowing that there was a chance that things wouldn’t go as planned… if I’d failed… I couldn’t leave it there.”

Ray handed over a bottle of chilled water and Fraser merely nodded his thanks as he twisted off the cap. Ray allowed him time for a few swallows before he said, “You didn’t trust her not to make the call. So you took the evidence she planted.”

There it was, straight from Ray’s mouth; the very thing that had haunted him for so long. He had known she would betray him, even if he did everything she asked of him, and yet he did it. Knowing that nothing would ever be enough, he had given her everything. Gone against everything he stood for in the vain hope that she would love him, maybe love him enough to do what was right. Even when she had proved she wasn’t willing to give an inch, he had been willing to go with her anyway.

He couldn’t contain the tears any longer and they streamed down his face as he held his breath, not wanting to give ground to the mixture of pain and relief that threatened to overwhelm him. Ray _knew_ how love could break a man. He didn’t need to be told.

He felt Ray turn, pull one leg up onto the couch and then strong, warm arms were coming around him, drawing him into a sideways hug. He resisted, knowing that any gesture of comfort would be his undoing, but Ray simply pulled harder and Fraser just wasn’t strong enough to do this alone anymore. He crumpled into Ray’s arms as the first sob tore free from his heart and found voice.

He felt a strong hand in his hair and his face was pulled against Ray’s neck, Ray’s chin resting on top of his head. As the sobs stole his breath and grief poured out with his tears, he turned and clutched Ray’s shirt in both hands and held on as though Ray was his only chance at life. A chance he hadn’t known he had.

It was some time before he noticed that Ray was rocking him slowly, like a child who needed soothing to sleep. He raised his head and looked at the wet patch he’d left on Ray’s shirt, but he was too numb and drained to bring himself to apologise. He untangled his fists from Ray’s shirt and made to pull away, but Ray just pulled him back in and said, “Stay awhile , Frase. It’s okay.”

So he did. He rested there until his face felt puffy and his nose was blocked and his cheeks were itchy from the tears. And Ray held him the whole time, not saying a word.

When he couldn’t be still any longer Ray let him sit up straight, patted his leg and told him to stay put before getting up and heading to the bathroom. He returned with a slightly embarrassed grin, a roll of toilet paper and a wet washcloth.

“I, uh, I don’t do the whole handkerchief thing. Not tough, you know? And I’m out of tissues.” He extended the roll with the air of one who expects to be bitten and Fraser laughed, which surprised him as much as it did Ray.  
“Thank you kindly, Ray. I think this is probably more suited to the magnitude of the task at hand now, in any case.”  
“Yeah, well… I almost bought you a towel. But that was just too disgusting to think about.” Ray replied as he picked up what was left of the drink on the table and took a swallow.

Fraser blew his nose, over and over, until his head felt clear and he had a pile of paper in his lap. Then Ray handed him the washcloth and he placed it on his overheated face, feeling the cool dampness take away the unpleasant stickiness he had forgotten was the aftermath of crying.

It was absurd, but he actually felt lighter, as if his tears had been weighing him down all this time.

When he returned to the couch after placing the used tissue in the trash, Ray cleared his throat.

“Frase, I got two more things I need to ask you. You think you can deal if I ask them now?”

“I know I can, Ray. Ask me anything.” He replied, suddenly aware that he actually _would_ be happy to tell Ray anything he wanted know.

“First? Did she really have a gun pointed at you?”

“No, she didn’t. She was reaching out to help me onto the train. I was going to go with her.”

“That’s what I figured. You think Vecchio knew that?”

“That she didn’t have a gun, or that I was trying to get on the train?”

“Both, I guess.”

“No, Ray. I believe he thought he saw a gun. He was trying to protect me.”

“Good, ‘cause it’s hard to kick a guy in the head when you’re supposed to be him, you know.”

“I can see how it would be.” Fraser felt a genuine smile tug at his lips.

They sat in silence for a moment, before Ray blurted out, “Loneliness sucks, huh?”

Fraser nodded wisely and replied, “Big time.”

Ray laughed as he stood up. “C’mon, Frase, you’re crashing here tonight.” He held out his hand.

Fraser let himself be pulled to his feet and said, “If you’ll just tell me where you keep your sleeping bag…”

“Nuh uh, I got a great big bed in there, and after the bullshit we’ve been through the last couple days, you think I’m gonna care if you snore?”

Fraser opened his mouth to refuse. This was not how he’d imagined being asked to share Ray’s bed, and he knew that Ray wasn’t offering anything more than a place to sleep, but it was clear that Ray needed company tonight as much as he did. It wasn’t everything, but it was more than he’d been offered in a long time and he didn’t want to say no, even if it was the right thing to do. So he squeezed Ray’s hand a little before letting go, saying, “I do not snore! Diefenbaker, on the other hand, sounds like a chainsaw.”

He followed Ray to the bedroom. His heart a little lighter for knowing that Ray was willing to go this far to comfort him; that the intimacy of sharing a bed was within the limits of their friendship. It may only be for sleep tonight, but now that they had dealt with the past, who knew what the future might hold?  


**Author's Note:**

> Lucifercircle posted a ficexchange request on live journal. She wanted Fraser to tell this Ray about Victoria. I foolishly accepted that challenge an this is the result. 
> 
> The utterly amazing heartofdavid and mickeymvt both helped me iron out the rough spots, for which I cannot thank them enough.


End file.
